But there are lots of people working on this problem. One of them is Henry Rock. Rock is the founder of City Startup Labs, an incubator for businesses started by young black entrepreneurs. And he thinks the key to closing the wealth gap lies in fostering local small businesses.

So where does entrepreneurship come in? “Self-employment is a way in which you can, at the very least, try to get control of your own economic circumstances,” Rock says. “There’s something very empowering about that.”

Rock would like to clarify, however, that when he talks about entrepreneurship, he’s not talking about Silicon Valley tech companies. “We’ve been fixated on the bright shiny object of high-tech high-growth,” Rock says. “[But] if a micro-entrepreneur was able to hire just one other person… we would be at full employment.”

More Reading:

Check out this report from the consulting firm McKinsey & Company about how diversity can impact a company’s bottom line.